


If you really hold me tight

by aryastark_valarmorghulis



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Boxing Day, Canon Compliant, Christmas, Comedy, Community: rs_small_gifts, Falling In Love, First War with Voldemort, Friends to Lovers, Hogwarts Seventh Year, M/M, Marauders' Era, POV Remus Lupin, Pining, Romance, Winter
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-03
Updated: 2018-12-03
Packaged: 2019-09-06 07:21:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,702
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16827859
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aryastark_valarmorghulis/pseuds/aryastark_valarmorghulis
Summary: Christmas break, 1977: a new flat, gingerbread and tea, a night in front of the fire, a bit of alcohol and a lot of unspoken feelings.





	If you really hold me tight

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ethereal_xo](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ethereal_xo/gifts).



> Huge thanks to [islndgurl777](https://islndgurl777.tumblr.com/) and [muse_in_absentia](https://archiveofourown.org/users/muse_in_absentia/pseuds/muse_in_absentia), and of course to the [Remus/Sirius Small Gifts](https://small-gifts.dreamwidth.org/) mods!  
> Dear ethereal_xo, I hope you like this story.

Outside the windowpane, Grafton Crescent had the monochromatic look of the old movies his mother liked to watch on the telly. Like in a fixed frame, nothing moved, not the grey clouds up in the sky, not the barren trees or the frosted leaves gathered on the sparkling pavement. The view was as still as a Muggle painting – or a photograph – if not for the blowing chimneys on the roof line in front of Sirius' flat.

Remus looked longingly at the white puffs of smoke curling up and fading out into the gloomy sky, absentmindedly picking at the frayed hem of his old wool jumper. The Bluebell flames Sirius had conjured up on the floor were crackling gleefully, their long fiery fingers licking at the frigid air. Too bad they couldn't keep the fire burning unsupervised when they slept without risking an Ashwinder; crumbling to ashes would be a rather undignified way to go for Sirius' recently bought flat and for two newly-of-age – and self-admittedly brilliant – wizards. They were in for a cold night, relying only on heating charms, blankets, maybe alcohol, and each other- the latter sadly only in Remus' deluded dreams, especially since Sirius was in a mood.

Since Remus had Apparated into 33 Kelly Street after lunch and knocked on the white painted door, Sirius had been restlessly tinkering with the light bulbs, the switches, the bathroom sink, the tub and the kitchen sink. Now he was sitting cross-legged on the dark wooden floorboards, poking at the cast iron heater with his wand, without any result whatsoever. Sirius told him he had tried every spell he could think of, and Remus tried a few extra things too.

“Sirius, if you're right there's nothing we can do, is there?” Remus repeated. _Only hope you remember to pay the bills next Christmas_. He refrained from mentioning this out loud: he preferred to avoid Sirius' temper. Besides, imagining the next year meant picturing a world post-Hogwarts; it seemed such an unfathomable occurrence that only a fleeting thought caused his chest to clench unhappily.

“I can break the heater to make it enchantable, but I'll have to disconnect it from the pipes to work,” Sirius replied, glowering. He had been sitting on the parquet for at least twenty minutes, muttering spells and swearing.

“See the stove? It's portable and broken, so it's not linked to the Muggle electricity system.” He pointed his wand at the kettle and, on cue, it started to whistle happily. “It's the same principle of my motorcycle, Moony: when it's only a disconnected agglomeration of iron I can enchant it as I want, but _this_ -” he waved his wand uselessly at the little space between the heater and the wall. “I have to break this shite,” he concluded in the brusque, clipped tone that usually forewarned trouble. “This, and the sink and the lights and the show-”

“Do you really think it's worth it to break the plumbing and the electricity system of your flat only to prove your point?” Remus went to the stove and extinguished the gas fire with a flick of his wand. “This place is way too nice for that. Dinner's ready, by the way.”

He poured the boiling water into the two white mugs he found in the cupboard, relishing the momentary steaming heat through his fingers.

“If you can call gingerbread and tea a dinner, Moony. Especially on Boxing Day.” Sirius shook his head, finally turning his full attention to him. He was wearing his heaviest cloak - he had very chivalrously offered it to Remus earlier, who had refused – and a grim frown on his brow. Remus wanted desperately to make him smile.

“But I like Mrs. Potter's gingerbread,” he shrugged, gesturing at the tin box full of biscuits laying open on the stone kitchen countertop. It was small and round, just right for two people and, after Remus placed the two mugs and the biscuits tin on it, it made quite the pretty Christmassy picture. The dimming light of dusk, a new place, hot tea and Sirius all by himself were the perfect late Christmas gifts. Who cared about mundane details like heating and water?

“I can go grab a curry or something,” Sirius offered, still crouched on the parquet, looking quite the Gothic hero, an exiled knight darkly out of place in his modern, Muggle flat. But Remus knew that once he removed his own smitten goggles, he was only a very morose Padfoot.

“Come on, Scrooge, I'm not even hungry, my mum stuffed me full yesterday,” he replied, sipping his tea, cradling the sweet heat on his tongue and between his fingers. “But if you want to eat something else, then let's go.”

“I'm not either, Euphemia and Fleamont cooked a whole banquet for the, and I quote, _lovebirds_.” Sirius spat the last word with the usual scorn he reserved for James and Lily's relationship. Remus braced himself for a rant that, surprisingly, never came. He suspected one of the reasons Sirius invited him to his new flat to spend the week between Boxing Day and New Year's Eve together was that Remus was the only suitable surrogate for James. Maybe there were other reasons too, but he didn't dare to dwell too much on them; they belonged to the invisible rope woven with unspoken things that seemed to bind them together, without ever being acknowledged.

Sirius, in a very dog-like fashion, crawled on the floor until he reached the counter, and then stood up to nibble at the legs of a gingerbread man. The flat didn't have chairs, a shortcoming Remus was almost glad for; it was oddly intimate, standing up shoulder to shoulder, stealing glances above steaming mugs. The light was fading quickly, bathing the flat in grey and stretching their shadows, but neither of them reached for their wands, eating and drinking in a comfortable silence.

They weren't strangers to spending time alone – especially after James was appointed Head Boy and Peter started to date Eliza – but it felt different without the buffer of Hogwarts' everyday life. The lessons to attend, the essays to write, the full-moon escapades to plan kept them so busy that an entire afternoon of quiet was rare. Sirius, as usual, broke the silence first.

“Moony, for real, though. You don't have to stay. It's bloody cold in the night, and we don't have anything, no wireless or telly- I don't even have books!”

Remus bumped their shoulders together. How easy it would be, to lean in and kiss his pale cheek, his straight nose, his red mouth. “Oh, well, if you don't have books then I'm leaving,” he joked, and then added, “I really have no idea how you can keep me entertained.”

Sirius only hummed. The exact time frame was blurred at the edges, but around the end of their fifth year and last summer, a not very distant past but apparently a different time, Sirius would have made an obligatory lewd, dirty remark about keeping him entertained. Now he didn't so much as wink at Remus anymore, at least not when Peter and James weren't around. This one lost habit was the umpteenth tile of the big mosaic of things that kept him awake at night: the looming war, what will happen to him after Hogwarts, and what was going on between him and Sirius. Nothing was going on, his logical brain supplied, but his lovesick heart wasn't keen on listening, and plenty of times Sirius himself made him pause.

Like when Remus, still sleep-slow, his muscles sore and his bones aching, nibbled his buttered toast absent-mindedly, his mind already bracing himself for the pain to come, and Sirius would snap him out of his moon reverie, shaking off the crumbs from his lap, his hands gentle, and lingering. Or sometimes during class, Remus had caught him observing – not even smiling, just watching with that intense grey stare of his that made Remus' traitorous mind conjure the magic, dangerous word: maybe. The way Sirius sometimes hooked his chin on that perfect spot between Remus' neck and shoulder, and together they would look at the map and speculate on what the tiny, winking dots were doing and why.

Now Sirius was blowing on his mug, his long dark hair swaying lightly, seemingly oblivious to Remus' pathetic train of thought. “I have plenty of Firewhisky to keep you warm,” he offered.

“Then I'll stay. If you have Firewhisky, we lack nothing,” smiled Remus.

“We lack everything, Moony,” Sirius argued. “Everybody thinks I'm so cool because I'm still in school and I already bought my own place, but-”

“Oh, not everybody,” grinned Remus. “I know you're a mess inside, only pretending to be cool.”

“Right. Just don't tell anyone what a mess my flat is, I have a reputation,” Sirius smiled his barely-there, conspiratorial, impish smile, that sometimes brought Remus to indulge in the harmless delusion that this smile was only meant for him. It also caused his brain-mouth coordination to malfunction.

“I like being here,” he couldn't help saying, and then averted his eyes, busying himself drinking a mouthful of hot tea and scalding his tongue to avoid adding ' _with you_ '. But Sirius was looking at him funny, so the unsaid words had seeped through or his stupid smitten face gave him away. They watched each other. All the writers that insisted on significant pauses where the lovers looked at each other in silence before they finally kissed must have been sodding liars, because Sirius blinked, broke the eye contact and asked, “Firewhisky?”

This left Remus with the usual doubt of being nothing but a poor, deluded idiot, quickly followed by the bitter, logical realisation that Sirius couldn't possibly like him that way. Even if he liked boys, how could he like _him_? So Remus always tried to convince himself that he was more than happy being friends, even with the dry throat, the glitchy hitch in his breath and the weakness in his knee joints when Sirius pressed their bodies together under James' cloak, or ruffled his hair, or, like now, sneakily stole glances at him.

They were both lightweights, and Firewhisky sounded like the greatest and the worst idea at the same time, so Remus said, “Sure.” After all, being drunk and being in love were, in his sadly limited experience, such similar experiences: the fuzziness, the increasing loss of clarity, the squirming in his guts and then, in the end, the inevitable sickness.

They laid on the sofa top and tail, and Sirius lined up two bottles of Firewhisky on the floor and opened up a third. The hissing blue flames on the floor beside them sparkled bright, like a winking star surrounded by the blackness of the night.

“So. We're in London, and you're a country lad,” said Sirius, taking a long pull on his bottle, his socked feet nudging Remus' hip. He was trying to play the cool, worldly man, but the effect was ruined when he coughed after he swallowed. Remus stifled a laugh. “I know a couple of clubs we can check out later. If you're up to it, of course.”

Sirius stretched out his arm and placed the bottle in Remus' hands, then relaxed his head against the backrest, waiting for an answer with a faint grin gracing his classical features. He was trying to gauge his reaction, but Remus was more than used to their dancing on a thin line of unspoken things. He only raised the corners of his mouth, offering a bland smile.

“Oh? Pulled a lot of girls?” he asked, as mildly as he could, sipping the Firewhisky. He tried not to cough, but he ended up wincing and wrinkling his nose.

“Wouldn't you like to know,” was the sibylline response. It was a dance for two people, and Sirius was just as good, smiling like he knew all the secrets Remus wasn't saying. “Don't you want to go and pull yourself?”

Remus traced the neck of the bottle with his fingertips, feeling his cheeks warm up, trapped between the heat of the fire and the heaviness of Sirius' stare. Before, he had been so sure about their appointed roles: Sirius the loved, Remus the lover. Now, alone in the dark, that axiom was starting to quiver.

“No, not really,” he said. He hated that his voice faltered slightly, and hated even more that it was the most honest reply he could allow himself to give without confessing his feelings.

“Why not?” Sirius poked him again with his big toe.

Remus wished to be drunker, more Gryffindor-y, or less himself, but he was who he was, and if nothing else, he could be patient and wait for Sirius to crack first. Or to let go.

“I'm not interested.” Remus passed him the bottle again, hoping to shut him up with the drinking.

“What about boys, then?” Sirius pressed on.

Remus' chest sizzled in tandem with the blue flames on the floor.

“Still not interested.” Remus closed his eyes and, like it always happened when they reached the brink of the cliff, he waited for the moment to pass, for Sirius to retreat. Every time they arrived at the edge of the abyss one of them always took a step back, never falling, never flying.

“Ow, ickle Moony is shy!” Sirius chuckled, and the moment vanished like this, erased like chalk on a blackboard. Remus opened his eyes again and kicked him lightly on the knee, relieved yet disappointed.

“So what do you want to do?” Sirius gestured at the dark living room. “My place isn't very, er, equipped for- well, for anything.”

“We can always write the Charms essay that's due-”

“Moony!” This time Sirius pinched him on his thigh, hard.

“Oh, I'm only kidding! I've already written it, anyway!” Remus stuck his tongue at him and Sirius huffed.

“I can't even say I'm surprised.”

“Why don't you give me the tour of the house? I like your minimalist style, by the way.” Remus hid his smile behind the bottle when Sirius flipped him off. The flat was spacious and clean, but very bare. The living room they were in only had a sofa, and the adjacent kitchen had neither table nor chairs. He half-feared and half-hoped the bedroom didn't have a bed.

Sirius reached for one bottle on the floor and opened it. “Honestly, Moony, I'm quite surprised you didn't lecture me at all on the whole bills fiasco, being Prefect and everything.”

Remus only shook his head. “You know I'm a lousy Prefect.”

And yes, maybe he should have lectured him a little, but the pained line on his brow and the downcast eyes when Sirius had met him at the door, combined with his efforts to make the appliances work told him that Sirius felt sorry enough without scolding him further. Sirius had a pretty rough year and above all, he was only seventeen: he was allowed to not know things and to fuck up sometimes. Besides, it wasn't so outrageous for someone who so far had only lived sheltered in the wizarding community to forget about bills. For Merlin's sake, when he was eleven he believed Remus lived on the streets because he was poor. And above all, it wasn't so surprising for Remus to find out that being too stern with Sirius was a difficult task.

They got sleepy very soon, and the Firewhisky didn't help at all when it came to discussing the nightly arrangements, since there was one bed after all, but they weren't tipsy enough to collapse in it together. They began a formal and very civilised back and forth argument of, “No, please _I'll_ take the couch, _you_ take the bed.”

In Remus' opinion, it was quite ridiculous.

“Padfoot, do we really have to argue about this? We can share the bed, since you're so worried I'll break my back if I take the couch,” Remus suggested, only to snap Sirius out of that polite, awkward dance.

At that moment, it would have been weirder for Sirius _not_ to make a lewd remark.

“You only want to have your perverted ways with me and deprive me of my virtue,” Sirius scoffed and tossed his hair back theatrically, finally sounding more like himself.

Remus smiled at the harmless joke. “You don't have any virtue left, Padfoot.”

“Maybe not, but I still have the decency to take the couch, especially since I've invited you to a flat without light, heating, or running water. So you can go to bed,” Sirius pointed his wand at him. “Or I can make you.”

A drunker Remus would have replied ' _Please, make me_ ' but an almost-sober Remus knew when he was defeated, so he raised his palms, said his goodnight, and went to the bedroom. He left the door open, not at all because he harboured the forlorn hope that Sirius would crawl in the bed with him in the middle of the night. Or maybe a little. Only in the eventuality that the couch might actually be uncomfortable and Sirius would crawl in the bed with him in the night with the very platonic purpose of sleeping.

He put some heating charms on the sheets and turned off the light from the tip of his wand. He was already nestled under the duvet when Sirius called him. Remus' guts did their usual squirm; how very Heathcliff of him to stop in the door frame dressed in black robes, a circle of candles floating behind him like an aura.

“If you're too cold I can give you another blanket.”

 _I'm so cold, let me in through your window_ \- and when his infatuated mind was screaming lyrics as an answer, Remus understood how truly, deeply buggered he was.

“I'm fine, thanks,” his sober brain compelled him to answer. “But there's enough space for two, you know...” He was glad it was dark because his cheeks must have been red like ripe apples.

“Alright, then.” Sirius shrugged and before Remus could even blink the breath was knocked out from his chest, and a big, heavy paw squashed his stomach. “Pad-” He was breathing fur through his nose and a long, raspy tongue licked his neck. “Alright, alright!” Padfoot sniffed his cheek one last time before curling up on the other side of the bed, finally satisfied.

Remus turned on his side and scratched him behind the ears before petting the soft, warm fur. Padfoot let out a soft whine, content. “Night.”

***

When he woke up, the tender light of day was already seeping through the shutters in thin dusty lines, striping Padfoot's black fur in soft yellow. Remus tried to swallow down the disappointment that Sirius hadn’t transformed back during the night. He looked at Padfoot's familiar muzzle, at the whiskers that trembled slightly at every snore, at the pink hairless line inside his ears, at the wet patch of drool under the elongated snout. It was unbelievable how he could look so peaceful and harmless, while during the full moons he was a match for the wolf.

When his stomach started to grumble he remembered they were completely out of food after devouring all the gingerbread. So, slowly, almost not even breathing, he took his wand from the night-stand to cast a silencing charm on himself, and then he slid out of bed one foot at a time. He gathered in his arms the clothes he had placed on the dresser last night and his shoes, and then he padded into the living room. He dressed hastily, goosebumps raising immediately on his arms and legs when he took off his pyjamas. He put on his old, scuffed brown winter shoes before unlocking the door with a wave of his wand and he slipped outside.

It was colder than inside, but not by much, which wasn't much of a solace since that night he woke up a few times, shivering because the heating charms had worn off, and he had to put new ones on the sheets.

He shoved his hands into the pockets of his father's Muggle coat, a well-worn brown montgomery lined with fake white fur. It was an ill fit for him – too big on the shoulders and too short – and also tragically out of fashion, but Remus liked to wear it because it smelled like his dad. He found two Galleons, one in each pocket. _Oh, Sirius_. He must have slipped the money in the day before when Remus was in the bathroom. He wasn't even trying to be subtle about it anymore.

Remus sighed and tightened his scarf around his neck, the sharp, cutting morning air already biting at his nose and ears. There was nobody in sight, the street awash with a grey fog that dulled the pink and yellow and pale blue facades of the buildings that flanked Kelly Street.

His wand, surreptitiously hidden in his pocket, lead him to a little grocery store nestled between a bookshop and a closed office building. He bought eggs, ham, milk, white bread, before going to find the items on sale: red cabbage, chuck steak and canned peas.

He glanced longingly at the bookstore on his way back, but he didn't have much more money to spare, so he hurried home, the soles of his old shoes skidding on the slippery frosted cobblestones. The hand holding the plastic bag had gone numb before he reached number 33 and Sirius' place felt already like a safe harbour from the icy loneliness of the foggy London morning. Not that it was going to be much warmer inside, but Sirius was waiting for him on the bed and it was more than enough to feel at home.

He tried to be discreet when he reached inside his jacket to point his wand at the front door, and he slipped inside as silently as he could, not wanting to awake Sirius- “Where the _fuck_ have you been? What the _fuck_ , Remus!”

Sirius was awake. And upset. He had his robes on, his trousers still unbuttoned and he was wearing only one boot, lighted wand in hand, long hair in disarray. Remus held himself very still. “Why? What happened?”

Sirius grabbed a folded paper from his pocket and threw it at Remus. It hit him on the chest and fell open on the floor.

“There was an attack at Diagon Alley, that's what happened! No victims and no witnesses because it was too early and nobody got caught. The area is being closed because the fucking Death Eaters could be still lurking nearby.”

 _Robbery at North Side Diagon Alley: possible Death Eaters connection. The Ministry advises to remain home until further notice, Aurors and MLE already at work to secure the area_ was glaring at Remus from the floor, above a picture of a familiar building, the Apothecary where he always bought his potions supplies.

“No Dark Mark?” he asked, finally tearing his eyes away from the discarded paper and looking at Sirius again. A muscle jumped in his jaw and his breath was coming out in quick puffs: he was livid. “And I'm sorry, but where the hell where _you_ going?”

Sirius opened his arms and tugged at his hair like Remus was being thick on purpose. “I was going to look for you, you bloody buggering _prick_ , since you had the brilliant idea to disappear without a word-”

Remus was taken aback by all that viciousness, but he knew how upset Sirius got every time there was an attack, and how protective he was, so he took a deep breath and he tried to remain calm and collected.

“I'm sorry, but how could I know there was an attack? I only went to buy some food-” he dangled the shopping bag in front of Sirius, who only glared at him, scowling. “And anyway, why would I go to Diagon Alley?”

Sirius looked down. Remus wanted to grab him by the shoulders and laugh in relief because they got lucky and nobody died this time, and also because Sirius was quite the comic picture, half dressed and missing a boot, his forehead wrinkled and his mouth a thin straight line.

“I thought you didn't have any Muggle money so I figured you'd go to Diagon Alley to buy something.”

Remus sighed. He went to the kitchen counter-top and started to take out the groceries one by one, putting Preservation spells on the food that required it and trying to swallow his own pride. “And what were you going to do, precisely? Apparate there even if the Ministry forbid it?”

“The Ministry can go fuck itself,” spat Sirius, joining Remus in the kitchen. He had put his other boot on, at least. “I would have hexed everyone standing in my way to look for you.”

Remus was very glad he had already put the egg carton inside the cupboard, because he registered the shaking in his fingers even before he felt the words snagging his breath. There they were again, at the very edge of a cliff, and Remus wanted more than anything to dive in and fall.

“Oh?” he whispered, uncaring about his broken voice because he was sure that his face was telling the story his words couldn't say.

But Sirius could. “I would go mad if something should happen to you, Moony.”

Words failed Remus. They leaned in at the same time, their noses brushing, a shy peck on cold lips, blossoming tenderly like a barely born leaf. They kissed again, and again, Remus' body shivering, Sirius' tongue in his mouth, Sirius' hands tugging at his hair and clutching at his arms.

“You're an excellent liar, do you know that?” Sirius murmured against Remus' mouth later, when they lay snuggled on the couch. No top and tail this time.

Sirius stroked Remus' nose and cheeks with his fingertips like he loved to look at his stupid, plain, scarred face. Maybe he really did, Remus thought, elated. He registered the words a few moments later. “What, why?” he asked, propping himself up on his elbows.

“Yesterday night you told me you weren't interested in any girl or boy...” Sirius trailed off, his long hair brushing Remus' face. He was smiling so blindingly that Remus felt drunk at the sight.

“I wasn't lying... I'm only interested in you,” he confessed, glad he didn't have any secrets left, because his only secret was wanting to be home with Sirius, to feel his strong body on top of his own.

Sirius kissed his cheek, nuzzled the scars on his neck. “You should come live with me after Hogwarts,” he whispered into his skin.

Remus already saw this coming; it was pretty obvious James was going to move in with Lily after school, and he thought it was only natural to be acting like a palliative to James and Sirius’s separation. But all this, this invisible thread that finally unravelled and then knitted back them together, couldn't be reduced only to James' unavailability. He hoped so, at least.

Remus carded his fingers in Sirius' thick hair, pensive. He didn't want the future to meddle with this moment; he longed to stretch and halt time so they could lay on that couch, clinging to each other, oblivious to the world raging outside.

“I don't know,” he answered. There were so many variables he didn't want to delve into right now- he didn't think he could get jobs in the wizarding community, he didn't have money, the war that he felt in his tired bones was inescapable.

“You're thinking too much. Say yes, Moony!” Sirius leaned in and licked his lips and kissed him hard, coaxing him with his mouth and hands and body, and Remus knew he would cave. He would say yes to Sirius because he didn't know how to say no to him and despite the months of pining, being wrapped up in each other felt inevitable, like the turning of the tides, like the waxing and waning of the moon in the sky. Deep down at the very core of his heart, he craved being like this every day.

“Maybe,” he conceded.

Sirius smiled. They both understood it meant _yes_.

**Author's Note:**

> Come find me on [tumblr](http://aryastark-valarmorghulis.tumblr.com/)!


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